Shadow of bill over port talks

By ROB O'NEILL

Ports of Auckland reconvened contract negotiations with the Waterfront Workers Union yesterday with both sides unsure of the legal environment in which the final contract will operate.

Ill-feeling over what the union describes as "harsh and oppressive tactics" in negotiations last year may also cloud proceedings.

Meanwhile, at ports around the country employers, workers and unions are trying to anticipate the changes the future Employment Relations Act will bring.

Auckland Waterfront Workers Union boss Dennis Carlisle said he would enter the Auckland negotiations assuming the act would be similar to the bill now before Parliament.

"The employer is probably in the same position as us, where they're not sure what the final cut will be," he said.

Ports of Auckland chief executive Geoff Vazey said there had undoubtedly been a change in the background to the negotiations, but the company could only formally negotiate under the law of the day.

Mr Carlisle said the union was considering legal action over last year's negotiations.

He said the union had to "bite the bullet" on the use of casual labour in some areas. It had to give tacit agreement to the use of casual workers for some types of unskilled work.

In June, Ports of Auckland issued redundancy notices to more than half its workforce at the Axis Fergusson Container Terminal, seeking efficiencies after Tauranga mounted a successful raid on Auckland's customer base through its South Auckland Metroport.

At the time, Mr Carlisle complained that the company was using the loss of trade as an excuse to renegotiate contracts under the threat of job losses and outside tendering. The union could not strike because there was a contract in force.

The use of casual port workers could be the issue that ignites future waterfront disputes. Mr Carlisle said the union had organised almost all the casual workers at Auckland and would seek to improve their pay and conditions.

The situation in Tauranga, he said, was different.

The union's Tauranga organiser, Steve Penn, said the use of casuals had started there. The port now had only 30 permanent watersiders, compared with 470 before 1989, and more than 300 casual workers.

Mr Penn said the new bill would give unions improved access to workers. Issues such as casual workers' entitlements to days in lieu needed to be addressed, he said.

"With the new legislation it will be easier to bring in some fairness. Casuals are very much left out in the cold as far as rights are concerned."

Workers were already joining the union at an increased rate in the feeling they now have some protection.

"The Employment Contracts Act never mentioned unions. It was designed to wipe us off the face of the earth, and it did well.

"We've had nine years to learn how to work with something as awful as that. Anything else will be a lot easier."

He said good employers had nothing to fear. "But I do think there are quite a few that will be shaking in their boots, and deservedly so."

Greg Dickson, chief executive of Tauranga-based International Stevedoring Operations, said future relations would come down to how employers, unions and individual employees handled the new regime.

"Since we have been able to negotiate directly with employees there has been a significant reduction in disruption and gains in productivity and technological change," Mr Dickson said.

If the union significantly expanded its influence by negotiating collective multi-employer contracts, there would be a shift in the balance of power.

Mr Dickson said he had nothing against unions but he feared a return to union-controlled labour pools, as operated in Whangarei.

"What we've got here is a significant threat [to undermine competitiveness] and the people that are going to pay for it are the exporters and importers."